Category: ICA – SpecTech

I have found After Effects a lot easier than I though I would and I think this is majorly to do with Carstens slow step by step tutorials which I really appreciate.

Below you can see I made an animated title. I did this by creating text and then adding 3d properties to it then adding a camera layer. Lastly, I added a solid coloured background and a glow effect. Despite using a coloured background on this composition I learnt today how to export a title sequence with a transparent background by changing the channel to RGB Alpha.

Over the past weeks I have been doing a lot of video editing for my work, although I enjoy it I wish I had known these skill earlier. I found that making the title sequences were very easy and made a big affect.

One trick I learnt whilst exploring this exercise was to start with the end in mind. It is a lot easier in fact I think you have to start at the end to get back to the beginning and it will look great.

I wish that the tutorial went a little more in depth as I feel like the titles we were taught to make are still very basic and some can be made on powerpoint.

I started off with a basic text box white writing black background. I then went to the place on the timeline when I wanted the animation to finish and place the subject in that position using anchor points. From there I worked backwards at anchoring the subject at different positions. I repeated this for the 3 sequences and lastly added colour and changed the font.

This was my first time using After Effects. I am so happy I got to do this excersice. I never thought I would be able to create a green screen movie although it is small and basic I am quite proud of myself, but in reality our lecturer Carsten always breaks each step down plain and simple which I am thankful for. I wish I had more green screen material to work with but I will definitely develop this technique for the future. I do like video editing which is funny as it used to frustrate me, however with more time spent just playing round with the softwares the more I become familiar and experimental.

Firstly I added the cityscape background image. I then transferred the green screen footage layer and went to the effects panel to search for key light in which I chose the green colour to be cut just leaving the action man. I added the remaining explosion layer but placed them behind the main subject. Lastly, I used the explosion as a way to fade into a title sequence to finish.

Firstly I made a colour swatch of 5 colours, I wanted to use this logo for our project work so we collectively decided on this colour palette. I especially like the grape and light blue colour. I then took our current group name and messed around with the size and colour of the letters to come up with some logo designs. I have gained alot more confidence in AI throughout this semester and will definitely pursue it especially in the process of making our digital publication for project.

Although I went further with the brief last week, here is the requirement using the gradient and stroke width tool tool. I really enjoyed learning these skills and have found the vector art really cool to learnt about. I really like this style of art and I find it easy, I will pursue the technique in the future. I also included some screenshot of the art work i am making for the project that uses the same techniques.

If there was any thing I learnt from tools last term it would be this. Practise makes perfect. Although I am not claiming to be perfect in fact I would say I am far from it, however, I do know that the only way I will become better at anything ESPECIALLY the adobe suit is my using it as much as I can for everything. This is what I did last semester with in design and now I love it.

After becoming more familiar with the other adobe programs I have gained more confidence in the formatting and found it is again true for illustrator. Although I did struggle in the first few hours, once I got into a rhythm and learn some of the quick keys I found I was going faster and more efficient. However, I do know with any artist including graphic design it just takes time and lots of practise to perfect your work.